Tom Hiddleston To Star As Loki In Spin-Off Series On Disney+

We haven't seen the last of this trickster (Photo by Vianney Le Caer/Invision/AP).Vianney Le Caer/Invision/AP

We’re about to get a whole lot more of the god of mischief.

In a recent press release by Disney, the entertainment giant confirmed their intent to move forward with a standalone series for the Avengers villain Loki, with fan favorite actor Tom Hiddleston reprising the role.

The release states:

“Disney+ is...assembling a live-action series centered around a fan-favorite character from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. [Bob] Iger today confirmed that Marvel Studios is developing a series based on Loki, the god of mischief, to star Tom Hiddleston.”

If Marvel is going to give a villain his own, Loki is the smart choice. Critics have written a lot about the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s so called problem with poorly developed antagonists. They cite Corey Stoll’s Yellowjacket (Ant-Man), Lee Pace’s Ronan the Accuser (Guardians of the Galaxy), and Christopher Eccleston’s Malekith (Thor: The Dark World) as all powerful baddies that just boil down to cartoonish villainy. But from his very first entry, Loki has stood out as the exception to that rule.

Loki is a huge fan favorite in the franchise (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer).ASSOCIATED PRESS

Before the first Thor film released, the executives at Marvel knew they wanted the film’s villain to continue on to be the main antagonist for The Avengers. So, they tasked the film’s writers to make a villain worthy of the role. In an interview with Screen Junkies, Zack Stentz, one of the screenwriters for the first Thor, explains the directives he was given by Marvel,

“They said, ‘Guys, if you fail at everything else, give us a villain as good as Magneto.’”

The X-Men villain Magneto has appeared as a powerful antagonistic force in six X-Men films and counting, largely because of the incredible depth of his backstory and motivations. So, Stentz and fellow writers sought to do the same with Loki by giving the audience a villain they could sympathize with. As Stentz explains,

“The thing that made Loki so close to our heart as a villain was that if you looked at the events of Thor from his perspective, he was the hero. He was the one that was saving the kingdom from his hot-headed brother who wasn’t ready [for the throne].”

In the film we learn that Loki was stolen from his birth parents, lied to about his origins, teased by the prospect of becoming king, and then robbed of that chance in favor of his incompetent brother. Maybe this is just proof of Odin’s poor parenting, but the narrative allows us to see Loki as being justly angry for all that’s happened to him. When he lashes out at Thor with his grand scheme, we understand why.

Sir Ian McKellen has played Magneto for years now (Westminster Abbey, London, England, UK).KGC-03/STAR MAX/IPx

It’s all that backstory, combined with Hiddleston's forceful performance, that has made Loki such a compelling villain. This level of character development has allowed the character to not only star in five Marvel movies to date, but also to come full circle to stand beside Thor as a hero in his final two appearances. So it makes sense to give such a character his own spotlight.

However, what’s not so clear is how Loki is supposed to star in his own show when the beginning of Avengers: Infinity War has him choked to death.

There are a few possibilities.

Loki has already cheated death twice, so some fans are adamant that he found a way to do so yet again. Another option is, since the next Avengers film reportedly deals with time travel, maybe some time bending will bring him back to life. However, the easiest way to go about this would just be to set the show in the past. After all, Loki has lived for centuries. So there are bound to be many exciting adventures for us to witness from his past. But as of now, which route the show will take is unclear.

Loki’s as of yet untitled series is part of Disney’s efforts to rival Netflix with their own streaming service featuring exclusive, premium content, Disney+. The Loki show joins other reportedly proposed shows on the platform starring Scarlet Witch, Falcon, and The Winter Soldier.

I've worked in Los Angeles and New York on film sets, studios, production offices, and more. I've also studied film and narrative at Princeton University with minors in Visual Arts and Creative Writing. Using all this experience I've spoken about the film industry at The Hu...